Railroad Street Bridge

"Marantette Bridge"

Visit MDOT's Page For This Historic Bridge

Visit MDOT's page for a preserved covered bridge near this historic bridge, which will be discussed in this page.

This Bridge is in Danger!

A Good View

There are lots of places to get interesting side views of this bridge. A nearby abandoned railroad bridge offers perfect mid-span side views, while some exploring alongshore can lead to other creative areas to get neat photos. The only thing hard to get of this bridge is a portal view, due to trees being in the way! Many of the results of all these locations are represented in my photo gallery.

Getting the Names Straight

MDOT incorrectly lists this bridge as Buckner Road Bridge. Buckner Road does not run south of the village of Mendon. This bridge is mostly in village limits, and as such is known as the Railroad Street Bridge, or locally as the Marantette Bridge. Outside village limits, the road ends at a "T" intersection, but another road nearby is named Bucknell Road, leading south away from the bridge.

Arguing the Date

MDOT lists a 1900 construction date, although a nearby resident I spoke with remembered the plaque as having a late 1800s date on it. I agree with the resident; 1900 is a default date used in the inventory when they surveyors don't know when a really old bridge was built. With the plaque on the bridge gone, and a habit of few records being kept on truss bridges, this is certainly seems like they could have had trouble with the date. Whichever date is actually correct, this is an old bridge!

Technical Facts

The Railroad Street Bridge is a Pratt through truss with pinned connections. Eyebars on the bridge are of the looped style. The bridge is composed of eight panels, and is a total of 139 feet in length. The bridge was built by the Massillon Bridge Company, of Massillon Ohio. The company ranked in second place for number of truss bridges built in Michigan. Guardrails on the bridge are original, but are a bit unusual. There is a standard lattice railing on the bridge, but it is mounted higher than the usual on the bridge. Below this railing there is a strip of two-angle steel acting as a second railings. I am unsure why the railings are like this. V-lacing is present on the bridge on vertical members, sway bracing, and under the upper chord. The portal bracing is a latticed design. Plaques do not remain on the bridge, although there was once one on an endpost, as well as on top of the portal bracing. The bridge is closed to traffic, and lattice guardrail had been welded onto the bridge to block cars. A local resident said that he thought the railing came from another truss bridge that is gone. Since no railing is missing on the Railroad Street Bridge, that makes sense. He also pointed out that the wooden deck had been vandalized by kids in several spots. The bridge sits on stone abutments, which appear to be in good condition, but if they started to deteriorate, would present a danger to the bridge.

Condition of the Bridge

 This bridge is in an un-restored condition. It sits in its original location in a park setting, a DNR boat launch site. The steel appears to be in great condition, however. A sandblasting and painting would likely keep this bridge's superstructure around for a long time. The abutments probably present the greatest danger to the bridge itself, if they start to deteriorate. The wooden deck needs work also, to keep the bridge around as a viable pedestrian crossing. This shows up as the last through truss in St. Joseph County, so ther bridge is locally significant. The bridge is significant on a statewide and national scale as one of a rapidly shrinking number of through truss bridges. With its original guardrails, it also retains a good degree of integrity.

Blatant Discrimination

There exists perhaps no better illustration for the mission of this website than to compare this truss bridge to the wooden covered bridge located a mere four and a half miles away from this bridge. See the MDOT link at the top of this page for a photo of the covered bridge, and then see the table of comparisons below.

Both bridges are clearly historic, but only the covered bridge has been treated as historic. This problem is repeated accross the country. People may argue that covered bridges are older and fewer in number, and so preservation efforts started sooner, and that makes sense, until you consider the bowstring truss bridge. Michigan has three covered bridges, all preserved, and only one bowstring on public roads, unpreserved. However, that one bowstring falls out of the standard 1870s context for bowstring truss bridges. The only bowstring in context in Michigan is now privately owned. As such, bowstrings are more rare. The point being that covered bridges are not the only bridges worthy of preservation. Other bridges are historic too! There are a number of people, myself included, that also feel that other historic bridges have greater aesthetic value than covered bridges.

The Railroad Street Bridge is not a bowstring truss, but it falls under the next rarest category of bridge in Michigan, that of the through truss. The real problem here is the fact that the government created a program to preserve covered bridges, and only covered bridges. This is absolutely absurd, because other bridge types may have greater historic significance, or be otherwise aesthetically of geographically suited for preservation. Local road commission are often forced to demolish truss bridges because the only federal and state money provided to them if for replacement not repair or restoration. Having a covered bridge program suggests that the government thought that only covered bridges deserved to be preserved. Instead, the government should have created a program to provide funding for any bridge that is eligible for the national register of historic places.

What is the cost of this unjust system for bridge preservation? Potentially any truss bridge that has been demolished, as well as other historic bridge types, such as concrete girder and arch bridges. Michigan has fared sort of okay, with the preservation of some of its rarest truss bridges, although their unique concrete camelback bridges are not being preserved, such as Genesee Road Bridge, Wadhams Road Bridge. No greater has the cost of the covered bridge program been more tragic than in Pennsylvania. The truss bridges of Pennsylvania, more unusual and beautiful than any covered bridge could ever hope to be, these bridges are one-of-a-kind bridges headed straight to the dumpster. A few of the best examples of bridges demolished or soon to be: Hickory Bridge, Shanley Road Bridge, and pretty much any bridge on my Pennsylvania page not in Pittsburgh.

The Railroad Street Bridge and the covered bridge on Covered Bridge Road stand together as a perfect demonstration of how historic bridges, and the people who appreciate them, have been discriminated against. The tragedy is that by the time anyone fixes this problem, it will likely be too late.